


how a gala can change a life

by dracarysdaenerys



Series: A Song of Ice, Fire and Oneshots [4]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Arya Stark-centric, F/F, F/M, Lesbian Sansa Stark, Long-Term Relationship(s), Loss of Parent(s), M/M, Modern Era, Modern Westeros, One Shot, POV Arya Stark, Relationship(s), Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:13:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24108781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dracarysdaenerys/pseuds/dracarysdaenerys
Summary: Arya is not exactly excited about going to the Stark's annual gala. At the gala itself, however, she finds an unexpected friend.
Relationships: Arya Stark & Catelyn Tully Stark, Arya Stark & Ned Stark, Arya Stark/Gendry Waters, Catelyn Stark/Ned Stark, Hot Pie & Arya Stark & Gendry Waters, Jon Snow & Arya Stark & Bran Stark & Rickon Stark & Robb Stark & Sansa Stark, Jon Snow/Ygritte, Robert Baratheon & Ned Stark, Sansa Stark/Margaery Tyrell, Theon Greyjoy/Robb Stark
Series: A Song of Ice, Fire and Oneshots [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1513850
Comments: 4
Kudos: 49





	how a gala can change a life

**Author's Note:**

> TW: at the end, the death of parents is mentioned. It isn't discussed excessively, only five sentences.

Arya was done with this. Every single time she tried to convince her mother that she shouldn’t have to go to that gala, her mother managed to convince her to go.

Arya thought her mom was cheating by having her dad tell her that she should go, which was just plain mean. Everyone knew Arya would listen to Ned sooner than Catelyn. Not only that helped, but through the years, Ned had picked up quite some tricks to convince his daughter of listening to her mother. Catelyn had told him it was a superpower of his.

Either way, now that Arya was sitting in a make-up chair, having her face smeared with all kinds of things by Sansa, she regretted listening to her father. She knew that if she had an argument with her mother and her dad came to her room, he would be tricking her into whatever they had argued about.

“Hold still, Arya, I just need to do your eyeliner,” Sansa said.

Arya mumbled out a soft curse towards her sister, but she stopped moving anyways.

“Thanks.” Sansa worked on that cursed eyeliner for a minute before handing Arya the mascara, the only thing Arya could handle. “Here you go,” Sansa said.

“Thanks,” Arya said. She did it quickly and sighed. She hated make-up, it made her face feel funny and she had to watch what she did with her face. “What’s next?”

“You know it’s the hair, why are you asking me that every time?”

Arya ignored her sister and leaned back again. Sansa would prepare her for every gala they attended, because, as she said: ‘you couldn’t be trusted with a hairdryer.’ Arya would disagree with this, but she didn’t bother anymore.

It took a full thirty minutes before Sansa was satisfied with the results. “Yes, that should do it,” she said.

Arya sat up in her chair and looked in the mirror. Her hair looked big. She couldn’t really be bothered to look closer than that. “Dress time?”

“Yes! I love our dresses! You’ll love yours.” Somehow, Arya doubted that.

Sansa walked out of the room. She opened the door to the dressing room, where two dresses were waiting. Arya was honestly kind of shocked, because Sansa usually picked out bright things, with tons of glitter and lace. Arya hated that. This time, however, she went with a simple grey dress. It had a decent back, it didn’t reach to the floor, so that was all in Arya’s favour, but it was strapless, and it looked fancy, so that was in Sansa’s favour. It seemed that they had reached the perfect solution. Sansa’s dress was her style, but so much simpler than what she usually wore. The satin dress was dark blue and had a slit all up her leg.

Arya looked at her sister. “This is a surprisingly nice dress,” she said.

Sansa looked back and smiled. “I knew you would love it! It is a very nice dress, it fits you! Let’s try them on,” she said. For once, Arya didn’t actually mind doing what Sansa told her to do.

The sisters both took their dresses off the hangers and retreated in the separate dressing rooms. Sansa was finished first, but she did need some help with her zipper. Arya was still in her own dressing room, but Sansa knew that her dress had a zipper too, so she just waited for Arya to come out.

The moment Arya stepped out of the door, Sansa’s mouth dropped. “Arya! You look positively radiant!”

Arya blushed at the comment. “Well thank you, dear sister. You look pretty okay too,” Arya responded.

Sansa just rolled her eyes. “Do you need help with your zipper? Because I definitely need help with mine,” Sansa said.

Arya nodded. She walked over to Sansa to fix her zipper. Sansa then moved behind her, not only to fix hers but also to let Arya see what she looked like.

At that moment, their mother walked in. “Are you almost ready? We’re leaving in ten,” Catelyn said. It took her a moment to realise how Arya was shining. “Arya, you look amazing. Do you like your dress?”

“It’s better than what you usually give me, I’ll give you that.”

The three Stark ladies walked out the door after Sansa grabbed their purses. The car was already waiting for them, and Arya was sure that their dad, Robb, and Rickon were already waiting for them, but that Jon and Bran both needed some extra time. It was like that every time. Arya was right, it was just like any other year.

Except, this time the gala was even more important. The Starks held a big gala every year. It had become a tradition and everyone in the family knew they had to go, though that didn’t stop Arya from protesting. This year it wasn’t just a Stark gala, with some people from affiliated companies, no, this year, the Baratheons would also come.

It was widely known that Robert Baratheon, the boss of Baratheon Corp, but now the owner of Targaryen Inc. too, had multiple kids. Only one of these was actually acknowledged by his father. Robert Baratheon had been married to Cersei Lannister, LanCorp’s heir, but she had cheated on him multiple times, leaving him with no children of his own. That left Baratheon’s companies without an heir. So, he had to look into his own past to check whether he had any illegitimate kids anywhere. Out came Gendry Baratheon, formerly Rivers, who went from a slightly below average income one parent home to a billionaire’s son, heir to two of the most influential companies in the world.

It was also widely known that Robert Baratheon wanted his son to get married. Therefore, any gala or other social event that the Baratheons attended meant immediate attention from the media. Everyone wanted to marry Gendry Baratheon. Arya was sure Sansa would go shoot her shot, too. If Robb hadn’t already been dating Theon, he’d probably try as well. In short, everyone who was even remotely interested in men and not in a relationship had asked him.

When they got to the venue, the place was even more crowded than usual. The media was everywhere. Arya was happy she was wearing a dress in which she was comfortable because it would be even worse when she was wearing something that she hated.

The Stark family stepped out of the limo, for once not the main guests. Obviously, they were still the hosts, but Arya was sure at least 40% of the journalists were only here because Gendry Baratheon would come.

She posed a bit for the photographers, earning their money for them, and then waved a bit. Sansa pulled her arm and they went inside together. Thankfully, the press wasn’t allowed inside, so here she was only exposed to people she generally knew. If not personally, then at least by name and/or face.

The Starks hadn’t been inside for five minutes when they heard the public outside go mad. That meant the Baratheons had arrived. Damn. Arya had hoped to make it at least thirty minutes before everyone started circling around the famous son.

That turned out to be another five minutes later, giving Arya only ten minutes to make conversation with some people before everyone turned his attention to the young Mr Baratheon. Arya rolled her eyes and soon enough, everyone was talking about him. Apparently, the only sane people were her siblings. Jon and Robb being in relationships, Rickon and Bran too young for anything of that kind. Sansa was also with them, surprisingly. Arya eyed her suspiciously but didn’t say anything on the matter. For now.

“Why is everyone paying attention to him?” Bran said. “I talked to him, he’s not even that interesting.”

“You talked to him? When?” Robb asked, surprised that Bran had gotten the chance to do so.

“Yeah, I found his Instagram and he accepted my follow request.” Bran always knew the weirdest stuff about people, so none of his siblings was particularly surprised. “He’s nice enough, but he’s just another regular guy. Who happens to have been put in the spotlight by being Robert Baratheon’s secret son.”

“Yes, and therefore being the heir to two of the most important companies. And he has some good looks,” Sansa said.

“Speaking of, Sansa, I expected mom to tell you to go after him?” Robb asked.

“We talked about it but decided that he probably doesn’t want to be swarmed and that we have enough trust in dad and Robert’s friendship for them not to turn against us,” Sansa said with much-practised ease. Arya would know, she had been next to her sister in too many business conversations covered as small talk. Strange.

The siblings were interrupted by Theon, who had been a friend for so long before he started dating Robb, that he was basically one of them anyway.

“Hey kiddos, what are we talking about?” he asked while putting his arm around Robb’s waist.

“The Baratheon guy,” Robb said.

“Oh, him? The cute son?” Theon said. Robb frowned at his boyfriend. Theon looked back. “Oh, you think he’s cute too, I know it.”

“Anyways, we just don’t really understand why everyone’s swarming him, he’s not used to the fame, right? I get that he has some nice looks and that he’s potentially the most powerful man in the future, but he’s probably overwhelmed as fuck. Why can’t people just have some common sense?” Bran dramatically threw his arms in the air.

A chorus of “Bran!” s followed his curse, but Arya just laughed at her younger brother’s face. He obviously forgot he couldn’t swear with his three oldest siblings around.

“People have never had any common sense and probably never will,” Arya said, still smiling.

“That sounds about right,” Jon said.

Suddenly, he jumped. The rest of the group saw that it was Ned standing behind him and laughed at his quiet yelp. “Dad!”

“Sorry, Jon,” their father said, truly sorry. “Why are you standing here in a group? Everyone is talking to each other, go participate.” Their father meant well, they knew, but Arya couldn’t help but think that they shouldn’t have to give up having fun with each other just for the sake of socialising.

“Everyone is just talking about that Gendry Baratheon, and we’re kind of done with it. Everyone his age, so our age, is talking about how they want to marry him,” Robb said.

“Why don’t a couple of you try to talk to him? Robert tells me he doesn’t actually like that much attention. Maybe you try to distract some people,” Ned said.

The siblings stared at each other for a second before all agreeing with their father. After some discussing and arguing, they decided to let Arya and Bran talk to Gendry, while the rest split up to distract the people bothering him.

It was easier said than done, they needed some help from some of Jon’s friends and Ned and Catelyn, but Arya and Bran managed to get through to Gendry.

“Hi, you’re Gendry Baratheon, right?” Bran started. He held out his hand for him to shake.

“That would be correct,” he said while shaking Bran and Arya’s hands. “You are two of the Stark siblings, right?”

“That would be correct. I think you talked to Bran here on Instagram, he said?” Arya said.

“Did I?” Gendry seemed a bit confused.

“Yes, you did, but I was on my private account, so you mightn’t have noticed it was me,” Bran said while looking pointedly at his sister.

“Oh, you were blackraven10?” Gendry’s face lit up with recognition.

“Yes, I am. How are you holding up with all this attention on you?” Bran said.

“Well, it’s annoying, honestly. People are constantly paying attention to me yet at the same time, they ignore every single thing I tell them. It’s miraculous how bad it is, I have no idea how you survived your entire childhood with this,” Gendry told the two siblings.

“Well, I think it does help that we’ve been public knowledge since we were born, so there tends to be less drama. We’re lucky that both our parents grew up in the public eye too, so we have someone to come to for help,” Arya said.

“Yes, I imagine that people would be a lot less intrusive with new-borns. Haven’t you ever been in some sort of scandal, then?”

“Oh, plenty. One of the most memorable was when Robb started dating Theon. He got a lot of homophobes after him, but at the same time, we got the LGBT+ community at our backs,” Arya said.

“Oh, and when Rickon got in trouble for running away that one time? People on the street recognized his face, and our parents got called by the police that he had run away before we could even notice. They got a lot of commentary over them for being bad parents, supposedly. It’s not our fault that Rickon usually sleeps in till eleven on weekends, and that he ran away at 7 on a Sunday. He could have been gone for five hours before anyone went to check on him. Good planning on his part,” Bran said.

“Your brother ran away? Why?” Gendry seemed confused.

“He thought that if he ran away, the media would leave him alone. He’s the youngest, and generally, the youngest kids always make the most trouble. I wouldn’t say he’s an angel, but he’s not the worst. The media always had a special interest in him over Bran and me. Sansa, Jon, and Robb all had a lot of attention, too, since they’re the ‘responsible’ ones, supposedly. Good thing they’ve never seen any of them drunk off their arses,” Arya said.

At that moment, Sansa joined them. “Hi, I’m Sansa Stark, nice to meet you!” she said to Gendry while shaking his hand. She turned to Arya. “Are you exposing me, dear sister?”

“No, not at all, Sansa. We all know you’re a complete angel,” Arya said, quickly sipping her drink to avoid talking any longer.

“Good. Excuse my siblings, they’re always like this,” Sansa said to Gendry.

“Hey! I can be professional!” Bran protested.

His sisters looked at him doubtfully. Gendry was struggling not to burst out laughing.

“I can! I can act like a human being, a normal, nice, professional, human being,” Bran insisted.

Sansa shook her head and started a conversation with Gendry about how his father had found him. Meanwhile, Arya was still looking at Bran.

“I’ll bet you twenty bucks that you can’t make it through the night being a normal, nice, professional human being,” Arya said.

“Bet taken.” They shook hands.

The conversation Gendry was having with Sansa was interesting enough, so the three siblings continued to talk to Gendry for a while.

Over the next thirty minutes, however, their number would decline. First, Bran was dragged away by Rickon who had become bored of listening to Jon talking to people. Later, Sansa’s best friend Margaery showed up by surprise. While Arya was happy for her sister to see her best friend again after months of separation, she was not very excited to talk to Gendry on her own. She quickly looked around the room for some backup, but Jon was talking to some of his own friends and Ygritte, who was, according to Jon, not his girlfriend, and Robb had probably sneaked away with Theon.

Arya accepted her fate and continued talking to the young Baratheon heir. He was surprisingly pleasant. Arya had thought that he would either be overconfident or annoyingly insecure. Instead of either of those, he seemed to act like himself the entire time.

“So outside of these gala’s, do you do anything else for fun?” Gendry asked.

“Are you insinuating I go to these gala’s for fun?” Arya smiled. “I really only go because I love my family. But I enjoy archery and nature photography.”

“Oh, two completely different things, it seems! I don’t really know too much about either, but I do enjoy the nature,” Gendry said.

“Do you get out in nature a lot now that you’re the heir?” Arya asked.

“Well, occasionally I manage to sneak out in between meetings. I grew up a relatively poor area of King’s Landing, I got out more there, but I get to see different things I would never have imagined to see. For instance, here in the North, I can’t believe the extent of the forests. In the south, farming has taken over everything except the King’s Woods.”

“Yeah, it’s a shame. I’m happy that we have some sort of restriction and wildlife containment policy. I love to shoot wolves and deer, they’re beautiful,” Arya said. Gendry looked at her weirdly. “Oh, photography, of course. No, I don’t do archery in nature, only on manmade targets.” She smiled at Gendry.

By now, the two had moved on to a table, sitting next to each other while observing the rest of the room.

“Do you have any specific interests?” Arya asked Gendry.

“Well, before my father found me, I would work in a workshop a lot. I still really enjoy just tinkering on cars and stuff,” Gendry said.

“That sounds interesting.” And it truly did. “I don’t know too much about cars, I must admit,” Arya smiled.

“Doesn’t matter, didn’t really expect anyone here to.” Gendry smiled back.

Arya looked across the room to see Sansa talking to their parents while all three of them tried to not stare at Arya and Gendry.

“Look, over there, my sister is talking to my parents about us. I wonder what they’re talking about. Maybe something about forming a further alliance between the Baratheons and the Starks.”

“Maybe they want us to get married,” Gendry said.

Arya snorted. “No offence, but I have no intentions of getting married anytime soon. Especially not to a guy I’ve only known for like an hour.”

“Contrary to popular belief, me neither. Dad just wants me to find a girlfriend, that’s all. He thinks it’s good for my image. The media just distorted that badly.” Gendry sighed and put his head in his hands. “So now everyone is hunting for me. Fucking media.”

“Tell me about it. Believe me, if I had it in me, I would already have murdered all of them already,” Arya said.

“You don’t have it in you? I can’t believe that.”

“Well, it’s really just my dad’s moral code talking. He engrained awareness into us. Clean up your garbage, make sure it doesn’t get into the ocean, shower quickly, use as little plastics as you can, that kinda thing,” Arya said.

“And the murder thing.”

“And the murder thing,” Arya agreed. “I was wondering… What is it like not growing up in the spotlight? What changed after you met your father?”

“Well, I guess that I was a lot freer to do whatever I wanted. I didn’t have as many responsibilities. Of course, going to school and helping my mom around the house was important. I never truly struggled to keep up with school, but it wasn’t very easy. I could go out with friends without having a full team of security marching behind me. Not that I talk a lot of those friends anymore. They all want to suck off my fame even though I keep telling them I hate it. Honestly, even though we didn’t have it broad before, my life has turned around for the worse,” Gendry said. Arya felt pitiful.

“I can imagine. I’ve always been stalked by security teams, and occasionally some actual stalkers, so at this point, I’ve tuned them out. I have some friends, but out of all of us, Jon actually managed to get the most friends who don’t care that much about his fame. They’re all here tonight. Sansa has Margaery, but she’s a Tyrell, so from quite a famed family, too. Bran and Rickon have Meera and Jojen as friends. Robb is mostly with Theon, to be honest, and they have some friends. I… well, there’s Hot Pie I guess, but he’s really just a childhood friend. I don’t know where he even lives right now,” Arya said.

“Hot Pie? I know a Hot Pie. He sells pastries in King’s Landing,” Gendry said.

“I don’t think there’s anyone else in the world calling himself Hot Pie. Good for him. He’s always wanted to start a bakery. His mom used to have a bakery in Winter Town, but after she died, he was placed in a foster family. He never talked much about his mom after that, but the dream of his own bakery always stayed with him.”

“I don’t know him very well personally, but his strawberry tarts are to die for,” Gendry said.

“Yeah, they were too when he left, I remember. I should visit him soon,” Arya said.

“Maybe I could come with? I like your company. You’re pretty much the only one that isn’t talking to me just to catch my attention.” Gendry smiled at Arya.

“Yeah, I’d like that,” Arya said.

The conversation derailed from there. They talked about tons of different stuff, one subject a bit longer than others, but it lasted hours. By the time the Starks started to leave, the two were still sitting next to each other. When Catelyn told Arya that the venue would almost be closing, they swapped phone numbers and Arya left Gendry, whose father had already made his way back to the hotel.

Throughout the next couple of days, they texted and face timed more than either of them would have in normal situations. Two weeks after the gala, Arya and Sansa tagged along with their father on a business trip to King’s Landing. Arya was going there for Gendry and Hot Pie, and Sansa for Margaery.

Arya and Gendry had a great time at Hot Pie’s bakery. While Gendry was paying, Hot Pie told Arya that she was a lucky girl with a guy like that. Arya blushed at that and denied them being in a relationship. But when she was back at the hotel, she started to think. Did people truly think that they were together? Her family had been teasing her with Gendry, but that was her family.

That evening, she walked in on Sansa and Margaery making out. While Arya was mildly shocked, she was happy that she hadn’t walked in on a later moment. Sansa made Arya promise to not tell their family yet. Or Gendry. Arya was mildly offended by that last addition, but in all fairness, it made sense. Arya did tell everything to Gendry, even though she was fairly sure she could hide a secret from him.

Ned found out about Sansa and Margaery the next day at lunch. He didn’t walk into them, but Sansa chose to tell him anyway. She did make him promise secrecy.

The Starks were in King’s Landing for a week, and at the last day, Arya and Gendry took a long walk by the beach. They were walking next to each other, happy to be in each other’s company. They stopped to look at the sunset. The two sat down next to each other, admiring the orange, pink and purple sky. Arya always loved the sunset. She turned to Gendry and smiled. He felt her eyes on him and turned to her, too. She leaned her head on his shoulder. He put his arm around her.

“Gendry?” Arya whispered.

“Yea?” Gendry whispered back.

Arya sat up. She looked into his eyes.

“What’s up, Arya?” Gendry asked.

Arya smiled at him. She couldn’t hold herself back anymore and kissed him. He kissed her back without any hesitation.

After a second, she pulled back. “I really like you.”

“I really like you, too.” They smiled at each other, content in each other’s warmth.

Arya and Gendry would end up married to each other after two years of dating, and one year of engagement. Arya was the third to be married of her siblings. Robb and Theon had married two and a half years before them, Theon proposing two weeks after Arya and Gendry started dating. Jon and Ygritte were happily dating with no intention of getting married. They said it was less paperwork, but Ygritte’s own experience with marriage wasn’t very good. Sansa and Margaery got married just three months before Arya and Gendry did.

Arya and Gendry were happy together, even when Arya’s parents were killed in a massive fire in Winterfell. All the Starks were devastated, none of the siblings being home. Arya was hit hard. Gendry was her rock in that time.

When Gendry’s father died not two months later, Gendry was suddenly swamped in his company. The couple was hit hard once more, but they got trough. With Gendry’s work as CEO of Baratheon Corp, and Arya’s work as an environmental lawyer, they didn’t have much time together, but they made the best of it. Arya had her siblings and Gendry had his own, who had slowly been found by Robert. Each of them got a major position inside Baratheon Corp, and Mya even got the entirety of Targaryen Inc.

Arya and Gendry would have one daughter, the light of their lives. Katie was a beautiful girl and her many aunts and uncles loved her.

Together, they could do anything.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> If you liked it, please consider leaving a kudo or even a comment! I would really appreciate either.  
> If you want (nearly) daily updates on me and my writing, follow me on Instagram (@notyourusual_writer)
> 
> Also: Sansa and Arya's dresses, if you're interested.  
> https://dtkp6g0samjql.cloudfront.net/uploads/photo/file/16277663/gallery_hero_a3dbe3d3-88be-468e-b0e7-6904b12cc665.jpg (Sansa)  
> https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/2158/0979/products/180903-ShonaJoy-70-1250_600x.jpg?v=1541122137 (Arya)


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